Results and reports by Event

Day 2: With the wind having increased its speed and rain quickly filling our boat we had a strong paddle down to our station, ready for a more confident race than the day before. Though hindered by a slightly squint start, we soon got straight and shoot off at excellent pace, making and maintaining good distance from the St Catharine’s crew chasing us. Though destabilised by the rough water and wind, we gave show of a much more confident row than the day before. Upon turning first corner we however had to stop rowing due to FaT blocking the river. A re-row was called.

Wet and cold, we spun and rowed back to station encouraged by the prospect of rowing with clear water in front of us. Once again, a powerful, sustained start maintained us at good distance from Catz up to first corner. We took the corner well, but as tiredness started to creep up from the bows, we lost some timing and destabilised the boat, starting to lose speed. Catz slowly but surely moved closer, having greatly distanced their pursuers. Having turned Grassy, we regained some of the strength, managing to avoid the bump almost to the Plough, where, with no little effort, St Catharine’s caught us. Overall, a much better row than the first day in terms of quality, though the technical precision and the stamina wasn’t quite enough to get us to the end of the course.

Uploaded Friday 8th March, 22:23

On Day 2 of bumps, W1 had a new plan in our minds- we decided that we wanted to row over. We knew realistically that we were highly unlikely to catch Emma again; they had simply been too fast the day before. However, we were quietly confident that First and Third, who were chasing us, were not as fast as we were. With Robyn subbing (thank you!), we rowed up to marshal in the rain and wind, apprehensive but satisfied that we would finish the day with a solid row over. Eventually we got to our station, which had crept closer to the deafening cannon, and before we knew it we were off. Our start was solid but it was quite quickly apparent that FaT were gaining on us. We didn't have any whistles on Emmanuel, but FaT had one on us, which rapidly went to two and to our horror, three. Then a combination of dodgy steering by their cox and, of course, fantastic steering by our cox put them back to one whistle. Worryingly, in no time at all they advanced back to three whistles but we had a massive push and pushed off them at the plough. Unfortunately, as we came round Ditton we were hit by the wind, and they responded really well to bump us just as we came onto the reach. It was a good race, with FaT just having the edge, and we were all somewhat relieved that we were excused from rowing at race pace down the reach in a strong headwind!

On Day 3, something had changed for W1. We arrived at the Boathouse with a new fight and aggression that had perhaps been lacking the previous days. We warmed up to some great hype music and everyone seemed raring to go- we wanted to bump FaT back, and we actually believed we could do it. After some interesting marshalling involving Jamie abandoning her crew and running down to the P and E to sub into our boat (thank you!), we again rowed up to station. Maggie were chasing us, and we knew they were fast, but we thought we could get FaT first. Our start was nothing short of ferocious and we quickly had a whistle on FaT, though Maggie also had a whistle (some strange horn actually?) on us. With Ben's angered cries of 'I want their stern on a spike' and 'race to Ditton' running through all of our minds, we gave it literally everything we had- an unpleasant taste of blood and race sweets in our mouths, but serious power in our legs. Maggie clearly also had the same idea, and by the plough they got overlap on us, and it seemed we would be bumped. Then came a shock- what appeared to be a crab from a Maggie rower. Ben yelled some motivational things and suddenly we had a bell on FaT coming round Ditton. Was this it? Were W1 finally going to bump? Sadly, no. We missed FaT by mere inches but a wobble in the boat meant we lost our bell, and also our energy. We had given it all we had to Ditton and though we maintained some whistles down the reach, these eventually died out and we resigned ourselves to a row over, which we did achieve, though for a short minute it looked like Christs might overbump us (but we were never really in any danger- as soon as Gripper yelled at us we dropped 10 seconds off our split). We were still proud and confident we could bump FaT on the final day. Sadly, that evening we had the news broken to us that CUCBC had decided on a rerow between just us and Maggie, due to there being some questions about them being awarded a bump on us. We decided not to attend the rerow, partly because we were completely exhausted and unlikely to be able to row well twice in one day, and also partly in protest at the decision, which (in our opinions) was questionable. This unfortunately meant we conceded the bump, and so going into day 4 we would be chasing Maggie - but that thought certainly ignited the fire in us.

Day 4 of Lent Bumps. It had not been the campaign W1 had hoped for and we were all upset and frustrated by the outcome of day 3. However, we had a lot of spirit and fight on arrival at the Boathouse, and we knew most boats on the river were backing us to slam into Maggie as quickly as possible. And we backed ourselves- we were fast off the start, certainly faster than Maggie were. The row up felt a little tired, evidence of how hard we had pushed ourselves the past few days, but finally our crew was reunited and we had one goal, fuelled by some Serious Rage. We would be starting directly under the bridge next to the cannons, and as the four and one minute cannon went we were all slightly deafened but very focused. To Gripper's final words of wisdom - 'this is personal' - we were pushed out and off we went. What an amazing start, you could feel the pent up anger as we slammed down the knees, and we got a whistle on Maggie very quickly. But we were exhausted, and Pembroke were incredibly strong. They were also feeling anger that they'd been denied their technical bump on Maggie the day before, ending their blades campaign. They caught us quickly, just before Grassy, despite us doing possibly our best rowing of the term, with Maggie going on to eventually bump FaT halfway down the reach and award themselves blades for the combination of their disqualification, overbump, 'technical bump', and bump on FaT. The spirit in our crew was still high though. We knew we could not have done anything more that day. Despite our technical spoons, there is a lot of potential for a fantastic Mays campaign, and although blading to Headship would've been a very nice surprise (or miracle maybe...) for us, we showed such resilience and unity, especially in the last two days, that we ended our Lent Bumps campaign still proud, and with our heads held high. Here's to a warm and sunny Mays, where we will be taking every possible opportunity to push Maggie down the starting order.

Uploaded Tuesday 12th March, 11:47

Day 1: We all started out very nervous in the middle of two very good crews; Newnham were ahead and Emma behind. Nothing remarkable happened on the row down. When the cannon fired go we had a reasonable start though we lacked some aggression throughout day 1. Emma had a very good start behind us and gained on us coming around into Grassy very quickly catching us well before the plough. Well done to Emma - they rowed boldly and quickly.

Uploaded Tuesday 12th March, 9:56

Looking at the quality of the crews around us in our division, we knew that we were ‘between a rock and a hard place’ (as Gripper called it). Behind us were Hughes Hall M1, a speedy grad college boat whom we knew would have a swift turn of pace. Ahead of us lay Sidney Sussex M1, we knew we would have to bump them fast. Before we knew it we found ourselves on station and being pushed out into the river with Nigel counting us down.

As the bang of the cannon sounded we launched into our start sequence, not our best but certainly fast. Quickly, perhaps within 15 strokes, we had a whistle on Sidney. This is where the pain began. Hughes Hall were also moving up on us from behind as we passed through the sloshing water under the Newnham bridge. As Hughes closed in, we continued to drive the legs and longed for further whistles on Sidney – but none came. Then, with Hughes about ¼ of a boat length away, they begin to fall away. For a number of strokes we continue to push off them, responding to the encouragement from the bank. However, Hughes find an extra gear and close in again, eventually hitting our stern and ending our race. However, Gripper is surprisingly pleased, saying we looked like ‘a proper second boat’ which was high praise indeed! Success and failure won’t be determined on the first day and, after our rest day tomorrow, we’ll be back with a score to settle.

Uploaded Tuesday 5th March, 22:54

Three days of bumps done, three places up in the division. The cannon got louder every day (because we moved closer to it), but it was worth it. On the first day, we bumped Pembroke W2 before the motorway bridge, while the mighty strokes of Corpus W1 weren't mighty enough to catch us. On the second day, we bumped Maggie W2 a bit further into the course. On CamFM, one could clearly hear Gripper, John (cox) and me (stroke) yelling at the moment of the bump. On the third day, poor Newnham W2 crashed into the bank so we got a technical bump, but we did not celebrate because their boat was literally on the cycle path and looked rather beaten. Some friendly rowbridges were sent to and fro and that was it. Our slogan (historically, this word means 'war cry') 'quantum peroxide' will today be heard on the river once again.

Uploaded Saturday 9th March, 11:08

On a nice but windy first day of Lent Bumps, a slightly nervous M3 crew rowed down to station. Luckily we found ourselves in the professional hands of Gripper and Nigel on the bank. We were chasing Jesus M3, and being chased by Churchill M2. When the starting shot was fired, we managed to get a fantastic start and we made up half a boat length on Jesus in the first seconds alone. We were steadily gaining on Jesus, accompanied by Grippers frantic whistling, but we also saw Churchill looming in the distance. Unfortunately, Churchill got to us just before we managed to get to Jesus, and we were bumped. Despite the result, everyone was very pleased with our performance, with Gripper even giving us one of his rare compliments.

Uploaded Wednesday 6th March, 10:50